Future of healthcare could lie in artificial intelligence technology

China's deployment of artificial intelligence technologies in the healthcare industry will continue to boom in 2018, better serving grassroots medical institutions in particular, according to industry experts.

The country's medical AI industry scale is estimated to reach 20 billion yuan ($2.93 billion) in 2018, surging 53.8 percent year-on-year, according to industry information provider qianzhan.com.

Xie Guotong, chief healthcare scientist at industry leader Ping An Technology, said: "AI is expanding at an exponential rate. The whole AI value chain, from the basic level to the technical and application levels, is full of opportunities. When you combine AI with the nation's trillion-dollar healthcare sector, especially healthcare at the primary (smaller, local-scale) level, there are infinite possibilities."